There are many facets to treatment of contaminated soils and aquifers to remove contaminants and many authors and laboratories have worked toward discovery of successful processes for doing so. The books Groundwater Decontamination from Hazardous Wastes, Princeton University Water Resources Program, Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1984, and Aquifer Restoration, R. C. Knox et al, National, Center for Ground Water Research, Noyes Publications, 1986, and references cited within these books attest to this fact.
This invention overcomes many of the problems faced in decontaminating soils and aquifers contaminated with either or both organic and inorganic contaminants by introducing into the reservoir an aqueous alkaline solution of polymer, surfactants, and additives where appropriate. The primary purpose behind the use of the polymer is to provide mobility control so that the injected solution does not finger through the contaminant or does not bypass zones of low permeability in favor of passage through zones of higher permeability. One or all of the alkaline agent(s) and additive(s) can interreact with the contaminant(s) to effectively remove them from the formation rock so that they can be displaced in the produced water. A major benefit is the substantial reduction in cost when compared with the micellar and other surfactant system flooding processes.